i recently fixed my totally thrashed mtb cranks - i've had this bike since grade 5 and done 13 years of sweet jumps and rad skids, killing half the original parts dead. These have been replaced with salvaged "upgrades" like the 60-foot steel seatpost from an exercise bike.

everything works awesomely except the front brakes are HOWLING - worn out pivots?

I haven't posted on BNA for a while (I felt like I had run out of things to say mostly). Here's a blurry photo of my last project, finished on the weekend:

Lots of cyclingdeal stuff on there (a build kit with handlebars, headset, seatpost, grips), a cyclingdeal single speed crank, cyclingdeal single speed adapter and chain tensioner on the back. the headset in the "Venzo" set did not fit so there is a correctly sized one in there in gold. Can't remember the brand (not anything good though).

Seat is a Selle turbo (reproduction). Forks are cheap Suntour jobs with a lockout (adequate for 80% of mountain biking, scary on the truly hard stuff though).

The frame is from the tip - a "quantum" aluminium job I sprayed flat black.

The wheels are Quando disk hubs (from dx.com) and Mavic rims (from CRC - $12 each!), plus ebay spokes. I was worried I got the spoke length calculation wrong but they worked out beautifully. The disks are "Bengal" hydros that I bought simply because the calipers and levers are gold and matched the "Venzo" bars.

rode it today to work and snapped the chain on the first big hill (did not seat the pin properly I think) so I need to get that sorted. Otherwise it's pretty neat to ride considering it's made out of stuff I had collected over 8 months of bargain hunting. The simplicity of it appeals to me (no cables!) Once I get the chain sorted I will give it a go offroad and see how it goes - not holding out any hopes for that fork in the really challenging stuff though.

So we get the leaders we deserve and we elect, we get the companies and the products that we ask for, right? And we have to ask for different things. – Paul Gildingbut really, that's rubbish. We get none of it because the choices are illusory.

I did a bit of lurking - I was bored with myself let alone inflicting it on the BNA community

So we get the leaders we deserve and we elect, we get the companies and the products that we ask for, right? And we have to ask for different things. – Paul Gildingbut really, that's rubbish. We get none of it because the choices are illusory.

My first MTB in around 15 years. Only picked cycling back up around 5 months ago and wanted to get back into recreational mountain biking. Probably a bit overkill for my uses, but half the fun is setting up a nice machine.

ldrcycles wrote:EDIT: just needs a gold chain and gold hubs and maybe a gold pulley wheel on the tensioner....

I've ditched the tensioner already - all I needed was about 1mm room forwards in the dropouts so I carefully filed a small notch in there. So no need to colour match the tensioner

I tried getting gold hubs and a chain but it would have blown the costs right out of the water - as it was the wheels ended up being $80 for the set with the red hubs which I thought was pushing it for something that is just a toy. The forks need to be black I think, that might balance it out a bit.

I am getting a jealous on all the 29ers in this thread. Those Yeti bikes just bake my noodle.

So we get the leaders we deserve and we elect, we get the companies and the products that we ask for, right? And we have to ask for different things. – Paul Gildingbut really, that's rubbish. We get none of it because the choices are illusory.

Still a couple of things left to do, fettling stem height means the ugly spacer stack can stay for a while and I'm still waiting for hose clamps and a new olive kit so I can get the brake lines properly tidied, I was a little tentative shortening the hoses. A Brooks Swift before long too methinks...

If you're wondering about the tyres, prime role for this steed will be urban assault and as a backup commuter. I've got plenty of knobbies in the shed and swapping over will take me all of 10 minutes if I want to hit some decent dirt.

...whatever the road rules, self-preservation is the absolute priority for a cyclist when mixing it with motorised traffic.London Boy 29/12/2011

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